Don’t Read TIME Magazine!!
Or NewsWeek, or any of the other kind of magazines that make you think about the world and problems and issues and things that are important to life and living here in America and on Earth. If you do, you will only be sorry. Like me.
I feel bad because I did read the TIME magazine this morning, BB (Before Burrito’s) and before Bike Riding, and it makes the silly stuff I talk about all day seem kind of lame. I should have a point or a view and opinions and controversy. But I don’t. I have ideas. But then I see a colorful bird in a tree or a strange frog on the sidewalk and I forget all about deeper issues.
I really do have a master plan, and I do have some really good life improving ideas, but I need to get through school first so I can start earning the kind of money and hooking up with the right kind of connections to put things in place. Plus, I have to get my kids up and ready for high school. That’s their first step toward all of the rest of the education they are going to be required to have to make any kind of difference in this world.
I bring it up now, because I am going to be posting stuff that I get from the “smart” mags along with the usual crap I get from the internet and the gossip mags my brain absorbs like a dried up jellyfish. Plus, I may be suffering some kind of post-exercise-nature-beauty-world-love withdrawal, as the coffee and vodka (not together) courses back into my veins and displaces all the healthy-oxygen-clean-pure-blood, but it takes time!
And! I have some International New Features I want to post! The BF’s good friend from work just moved to Germany with her hubby and sent an e-mail and photo’s that are absolutely out of this world, funny and brilliant and real-world people perspective of other places on the globe. And she said I could post it all here!
For now though, here’s my stuff: We rode those bikes, in the rain (it stopped now and then) for 19.2 miles! Once we got out there the actual trail was a bit longer. Took us One hour and 45 minutes. Not bad for ups/downs/traffic/road crossings/the requisite work phone call (BF is on the job) and a stop to take a picture of an old cemetery that was there in the early 1900’s. The sign explains it, but the Forest Preserve acquired the land with the cemetery on it and chose to keep it as it was. History and all. Now you can say the site is educational and we can both feel better.
There were power lines too! Giant, humming, massive towers that were really crackling in the rain. I was so in awe of being that close and riding underneath all of them that I forgot to take any pictures. It’s probably good anyway. I would have pulled my phone out, aimed it up at the wires and got electrocuted when an arc of electricity shot out and grabbed the cell killing me on the spot. That would have sucked.
See? No sense of world. Ooooh…power lines. Electricity. Well, without it, we couldn’t type or read this, so….it needs to propped!
Anyway, if we go back tomorrow—which I’d like to—I will get those pics. It is pretty amazing. I know people that live by them don’t necessarily think so, but I don’t have my brains getting fried on a day-to-day basis…or…?? Just kidding. Seriously. I don’t really think brains are getting fried just because of power lines. You don’t need to live by the high wire to get the high if you know what I mean.
Also, in case you were wondering, I think I successfully burned off all the cals from those terrible, but delicious burrito’s. I checked the internet for an exercise calculator and it says I did. Now, what’s for dinner? Let me finish my vodka lemonade and think about it while you look at pictures of headstones and a sign.
Come On People! Help me break 3000 Hits! Tonight! July 30, 2009.
Tell your friends, call your family, leave it on at work, link me to something, hook me up, pass me around…I only need 50 plus people to click on my silly stories. You know there’s fifty of you out there who like to laugh! I’m pretty funny!
We have booty pictures, fancy cars, animals, life, death, love, joy, struggles, pain, triumph…it’s all here…for free!
Hang around. Keep coming back! There’s definitely something for everyone! My words are like bacon. Everybody loves bacon!
Sad news from our aqua-world.
Something was wrong with Mason’s puffy-eye goldfish for quite some time now, but we didn’t know what. We could tell though, that it didn’t look good. And survival of whatever ailed it was not hopeful. After a hard fought battle, he struggled desperately this week to live, I am sorry to say, that he is gone. As of last night, I found it necessary to put him out of his misery.
And without even one bit of exaggeration or sarcasm, I really felt sorry for that poor fish. And I am not ashamed to say that I cried. In fact, I am crying right now typing about him. Watching him try to eat and breathe and swim was just awful. If you could imagine yourself ever wondering if fish have feelings or if they suffer at all, you would know that it could be true looking at this particular goldfish.
I watched him a few nights ago searching the water for food. I could tell he was having a hard time finding it. He used to have very big bags around his eyes when we first got him, that’s the type he was. Just recently, the puffs were beginning to grow again. Sometimes they do. Unfortunately his life was rough from the start. We didn’t know at the time that those kind of goldfish are susceptible to getting those baggy eyes punctured. Which happened almost immediately. The internet said he may die from it. But he didn’t. In fact, he recovered and looked better than ever.
Then a few of the other goldfish Mason had in his tank started to attack him. They eventually ended up nipping off one of his three, long, tail fins. Then just as abruptly, they stopped. The puffy-eye seemed fine even after that. He swam a little weirdly and not always straight, but he was very tough and endearing and had personality, if a fish can, and we really fell in love with him.
Let me just say here, that we have had A LOT of fish come through this house. I mean, A LOT, a lot. And we have dealt with many dead fish so it’s not like we are over prone to fish affection but, this one really did seem special. It’s weird until you own a really good one and then you see. At any rate these last few weeks we watched him suddenly grow bigger and bigger. His body started to get fatter and fatter as if he was going to burst. We managed to get one picture of him, looking pretty good for all his trouble. You can kind of see where he was becoming so fat. In the last 2 days his scales seemed to be lifting off of him and I knew we were close to the end.
Then last night when I went in to feed him, puffy-eye was laying at the bottom, kind of half-in and half-out of Mason’s decoration Colosseum. He was gasping but not moving. It didn’t look like he would be able to get himself out of there. So, I nudged him free and he floated helplessly to the top, just staring at me, gasping for air (?). I couldn’t stand it. He LOOKED miserable. I don’t care what anyone says, that fish was not without some kind of pain. So I ended it for him. And I cried.
I feel kind of silly for being overly emotional about a fish, but he was part of the Aqua-World that we have been creating all the years of my children’s lives. And I cried, because Mason and Stevie really loved that fish too, and they weren’t here to see him go. They knew when they left that there was a good chance he would be gone by the time they get home next week, but I was kind of hoping that little guy could have made it, or suddenly got better and been perfectly normal again. But it was not to be.
So this is my little eulogy to another fish that has swam in and swam out of our lives yet again. He was a funny, puffy, silly, lopsided little fish that we adored.
Rest in Peace.
And if you would like to read more about the love these little fish seem to invoke, please click here.
Day Quote
I remember my youth and the feeling that will never come back anymore—the feeling that I could last for ever, outlast the sea, the earth, and all men; the deceitful feeling that lures us on to perils, to love, to vain effort—to death; the triumphant conviction of strength, the heat of life in the handful of dust, that glow in the heart that with every year grows dim, grows cold, grows small, and expires—and expires, too soon, too soon—before life itself.
—Joseph Conrad
There IS death in the cup…Beware!
Death in the cup by way of Vodka and Pepsi. Aren’t I smart?
Had such a good day yesterday, just hanging out at home, and posting silly stuff on the internets, and then I had to go and ruin it by trying to eat myself to death and drinking the vodkas and the pepsi’s.
Seriously, I thought that I would have to go to the hospital. I stuffed every last single piece of pizza into my mouth that I could ferret out of the large pizza box. If you’re hand was anywhere near the zone of the pizza box you would have gotten hurt. Then, I was chugging down Pepsi and Vodka, it was good, better than popsicles and vodka, but even more filling.
By the time I was done sucking every last drop of Pepsi from the 2-liter and picking every crusty olive and onion off the cardboard and watching the last episode of 2½ Men/Season 3 (CLIFF hanger!), I was over. I was paralyzed and in a food coma. Not even a coma, because in a coma I would have been sleeping. This was like being pregnant again. A giant ball in the middle of my stomach that I couldn’t move or manuever with. I wanted to go and make myself throw up just to relieve the pressure, but I couldn’t stand.
And now I was thirsty as hell. The pizza we get has, like, every ingredient you can think of except sardines. So obviously, you can get kind of parched from all the salt. So I tried to sip water, but it was so good and hydrating. Now I’m water-full on top of full-full. I put the kids to bed and laid down. The BF tried to be nice and rub my belly, but I didn’t want anybody or anything touching it.
I was actually thinking about those sitcom shows that have people who eat too much laying around with their shirts up and pants off, moaning and groaning all droopy eyed and turning green and running toward the toilet getting ready to vomit. I felt exactly like that. I even thought, “Hmm, I guess this is an actual reality.” I have never eaten that much in my whole life. Or maybe I have but my stomach is smaller now, it doesn’t really matter, because obviously I didn’t die, but I have made a vow to never eat that much again. Or crap food. I will however, continue to drink vodka with various mixers, it’s not the alcohols fault for cry-yie!
In honor of my new vows to health, I went immediately to the trail after the kids went to school, and ran my still-bloated ass around the track for 3+ miles. It wasn’t pretty. It was hot and I was sweating pizza grease. That IS as gross as it sounds. I think I could smell sausage…YUCK.
I ate one banana so far, and drank a whole pot of coffee. That’s how I de-tox. Do it your way, I’ll do it mine.
It’s 5 pm and I am heading out to buy 2½ Men/ Season 4. Then I’ll be eating Chinese with the BF. (I’ll actually only be eating white rice, but I can smell it and that’s just as good.)
Tomorrow, the BF is off work and I guess we are doing a “spin” class. First time for both of us. That should be fun, she says sarcastically. It always looks hard. Those people are always sweaty and beat looking when it’s over. I’ll let you know.
And in case you were wondering about a weight update…didn’t gain a pound. Didn’t lose anything either, but I think that’s ok. I should have died with all that food I ate, but it didn’t stick. I might not get so lucky next time. Better stay on the safe side. Besides I still have 2 days before the day I deemed my official weigh in. Which will always be 2 days from today…hahaha.
I actually have a playlist to put out, in honor of all the colorful things that would have spilled into the toilet if I had enough nerve to make myself throw up. I don’t. Bulimia is not for me. The list is called,
And it was originally for all those crayons I picked up off the trail a few weeks back. So you decide which personal event in my life you’d like to associate it with. It’s like a mystery ending web post! Exciting!
The picture below is a memory-refresher. Crayons on a table.
The actual list will be posted shortly. Wait for it now, it’s 99 songs long. I went a little crazy with color. You can use it for more than running, or you can use it for a week of running…again…your choice! (“Choose your own ending”, that’s what those books are called)
Enjoy the picture.
Relive the memory of how I got them,
and the memory continues here,
and check back in say, 7 hours. It’s 5:20 now, I have to drive and eat and watch tv, and then type 99 songs in a row and add color and links and finally hit publish. It WILL be worth the wait.
Update!
I actually got 101 songs. Thought of two more typing the list–2 great songs that bring it all together at the end.
And it’s in under the 7-hour mark. Goodnight Chicago.
just shy of pretty 